Hon. John P. Altgeld,
_Governor of Illinois_.
This closed a discussion which in its net results demonstrated how far
one’s disposition and inclination will lead him astray in the field of
argument.
I shall conclude the treatment of my subject by a brief reference to
the legal proceedings which grew out of this disturbance, and finally
led to an adjudication by the highest court in our land, establishing
in an absolutely authoritative manner and for all time the power of the
national Government to protect itself in the exercise of its functions.
It will be recalled that in the course of our narrative we left Mr.
Debs, the president of the Railway Union, and his three associates
in custody of the law, on the seventeenth day of July, awaiting an
investigation of the charge of contempt of court made against them,
based upon their disobedience of the writs of injunction forbidding
them to do certain things in aid or encouragement of interference with
mail transportation or interstate commerce.
This investigation was so long delayed that the decision of the Circuit
Court before which the proceedings were pending was not rendered until
the fourteenth day of December, 1894. On that date the court delivered
an able and carefully considered decision finding Debs and his
associates guilty of contempt of court, basing its decision upon the
provisions of the law of Congress, passed in 1890, entitled: “An act to
protect trade and commerce against unlawful restraint and monopolies”;
sometimes called the Sherman Anti-Trust Law. Thereupon the parties
were sentenced on said conviction to confinement in the county jail for
terms varying from three to six months.
Afterward, and on the 14th day of January, 1895, the prisoners applied
to the Supreme Court of the United States for a writ of habeas corpus
to relieve them from imprisonment, on the ground that the facts found
against them by the Circuit Court did not constitute disobedience of
the writs of injunction and that their commitment in the manner and
for the reasons alleged was without justification and not within the
constitutional power and jurisdiction of that tribunal.
On this application, the case was elaborately argued before the Supreme
Court in March, 1895; and on the twenty-seventh day of May, 1895, the
court rendered its decision, upholding on the broadest grounds the
proceedings of the Circuit Court and confirming its adjudication and
the commitment to jail of the petitioners thereupon.
Justice Brewer, in delivering the unanimous opinion of the Supreme
Court, stated the case as follows:
The United States, finding that the interstate transportation
of persons and property, as well as the carriage of mails,
is forcibly obstructed, and that a combination and conspiracy
exists to subject the control of such transportation to the
will of the conspirators, applied to one of their courts
sitting as a court of equity, for an injunction to restrain
such obstructions and prevent carrying into effect such
conspiracy. Two questions of importance are presented: First,
are the relations of the general Government to interstate
commerce and the transportation of the mails such as to
authorize a direct interference to prevent a forcible
obstruction thereof? Second, if authority exists,--as authority
in governmental affairs implies both power and duty,--has a
court of equity jurisdiction to issue an injunction in aid of
the performance of such duty?
Both of these questions were answered by the court in the affirmative;
and in the opinion read by the learned justice, the inherent power of
the Government to execute the powers and functions belonging to it
by means of physical force through its official agents, and on every
foot of American soil, was amply vindicated by a process of reasoning
simple, logical, unhampered by fanciful distinctions, and absolutely
conclusive; and the Government’s peaceful resort to the court, the
injunction issued in its aid, and all the proceedings thereon,
including the imprisonment of Debs and his associates, were fully
approved.
Thus the Supreme Court of the United States has written the closing
words of this history, tragical in many of its details, and in every
line provoking sober reflection. As we gratefully turn its concluding
page, those who were most nearly related by executive responsibility to
the troublous days whose story is told may well especially congratulate
themselves on the part which fell to them in marking out the way and
clearing the path, now unchangeably established, which shall hereafter
guide our nation safely and surely in the exercise of the important
functions which represent the people’s trust.